Black-Haired Dad Isn’t Something You Reap - Chapter 69

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 69. A Side Story About Helbatro Here? Really? (3)
There was a state funeral. My mother passed away suddenly before my child could even celebrate his second birthday. I couldn’t believe it. Just days before, she had been in perfect health—such a sudden death seemed impossible. Something felt wrong, but I was given no time to investigate, forced instead to hastily assume the throne.
With the pillar of the previous Emperor gone, the military leadership and high nobility swayed without restraint. They knew I was incompetent, after all.
Military reports began reaching the Military Minister before they reached me, and the nobility started clinging together in their own factions.
It was exhausting. Unbearably exhausting. I tried seeking help from the Lorowi Marquis—my wife’s family—but my suggestion to invite the Marquis to the Capital and have her serve as my advisor was flatly rejected.
Instead, as if she intended to talk me to death, she passed the Marquis title to her younger daughter and retired. I couldn’t appoint a woman who had become an advisor to the Lorowi house as an advisor to the Imperial State.
She had done it knowingly. That woman had despised me ever since giving me Lutia. So this time, I thought I had finally caught her in a mistake.
To make matters worse, Lutia was growing increasingly frail. I had once heard the term “pregnancy poisoning,” and it seemed the condition never improved and brought complications. Since last year, I could see her wasting away, and now she wouldn’t even meet with me alone without a screen. She said she didn’t want to show me her ugliness.
Lutia reeked of decay and something like rotting meat. I stopped visiting the Empress Palace.
I had no one by my side. No one was on my side. Lutia was dying, and Ende had locked herself in the Prison, saying she wouldn’t engage in outside activities until her nephew came of age.
Desperate for relief, I turned to alcohol and other women. At first, it felt liberating. Even when I became infatuated with other women, Lutia didn’t interfere. It was good. But soon it became tedious. I felt lonely.
How could I make Lutia angry and spirited again like before?
A good idea came to me. Emily, wasn’t that her name? The attendant Lutia always brought with her—if I sent an official order summoning her to the Imperial Bedchamber, I thought she would respond. But if I forced her, Lutia would truly come to hate me, so I couldn’t bring myself to use that method.
So I issued a threat: come or be flogged. But that attendant had a temperament identical to her mistress and refused to the end, saying she would rather take the beating. Emily was sentenced to the whip, and not long after, her wounds became infected and she died, or so I heard.
After that, my life knew only decline. Lutia remained quiet for a while, then one day she came to the Imperial Bedchamber. By some means I couldn’t fathom, her skeletal frame carried an oil canister, and the women around me fled in panic.
“I will die soon anyway. So this is the only way. We must die together.”
What nonsense was this? Even sick, even wasted away, she was still beautiful—so why had she been using that screen all this time?
As questions assailed me, the woman poured oil over her entire body and ignited herself with the force of the explosion. The bed caught fire, and the flames spread to me. The smell of burning flesh filled the air. It was horrific.
“Imperial Guard! Quickly! Remove this mad woman!”
I didn’t want to die. Why should I die just because she was dying? This made no sense.
The fire was hot, painful, and reeked. The smell of burning flesh.
“Your Majesty, are you all right!”
“The smell—ugh!”
Don’t open the window so quickly! I think ash is stuck in my nostrils!
It was horrific. So utterly horrific. The smell was horrific, and the sight of the woman growing smaller was horrific. I lost consciousness and lay ill for days. When I came to, Lutia’s funeral was already over.

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“Ugh.”
The smell. It lingered. Even after changing the Imperial Bedchamber, even after scrubbing my body until it bled, the acrid stench of charred flesh persisted. With every breath I drew, it filled my nostrils. If I simply stopped breathing, wouldn’t that solve it? But people died when they stopped breathing. I didn’t want to die. Yet the smell remained.
Fragments of a woman lodged in my nasal passages, destined perhaps to remain there eternally. I felt myself slipping toward madness. Wouldn’t it be better to die like this? If I had to live with this, it would have been far better to have perished alongside Lutia.
“Your Majesty, please compose yourself. The Lorowi Marquis has arrived.”
Ah. The nagging Chamberlain had come? I grasped Tania’s withered hand and pressed my forehead against it in supplication. I’m suffering so much, Tania. I’m suffering so much.
“You are the Emperor. You must shake this off and rise again.”
Can’t I skip being Emperor? I never wanted to do this from the start. What? I’m suffering so much.
“It seems the Lorowi Marquis has brought a restorative tonic. The spirit stone used for poison detection found no abnormalities.”
How strange that she didn’t attend our daughter’s wedding, yet she comes to the funeral. But whether it’s her or me, we’ve both lost Lutia. The grief must be equally unbearable.
When I said I would meet with her, the Chief Chamberlain struck my back sharply and spoke in a trembling voice.
“Your Majesty, your hunched back is the result of your own doing. That woman will say you can’t even sit properly.”
“She’ll see my flaws at any time anyway, so what does it matter.”
“Straighten your back and hold yourself with dignity!”
Tania sniffled and hurried away, claiming she had urgent business. Living this long, I’ve witnessed even the Chamberlain weeping.
“Have you been well, Your Majesty.”
“Do I appear well to you?”
“Not particularly, I’m afraid.”
The Lorowi Marquis appeared in mourning garments. It was only natural she would dress thus, having lost a daughter. More surprising was that this woman actually owned clothing other than her commander’s uniform.
“It is a juice-form tonic that my army also employs. I have adjusted the formula somewhat for Your Majesty’s benefit.”
“A tonic, not a restorative? What kind of tonic is it?”
“One that helps one forget unpleasant things.”
“….”
That sounds like a dangerously potent substance. Yet it had passed the Imperial Palace’s poison detection inspection, so regardless of its efficacy, it shouldn’t be the sort of thing harmful to the body.
“If it pleases you, I shall continue sending it.”
“Well, I suppose it’s worth trying.”
After the Lorowi Marquis departed, I succumbed to the pressure of attending to state affairs and drained the tonic in one gulp. Remarkably, the acrid stench that had filled my nostrils vanished.
The unpleasant odor was gone. Strangely, I even felt motivation to work returning. I had been suspicious because it came from the Lorowi Marquis, but this truly was a genuine health tonic.
I threw myself into state affairs with the aid of the tonic, seeking to forget all that was unbearable. After continuing this for roughly half a year, strange things began to occur.
At first came lethargy. The tonic had clearly invigorated me when I drank it, but its effects gradually diminished until I required it three times daily just to function normally.
And then something curious happened—when I drank the tonic, I could meet those I longed for. The Empress Mother remained vigorous and well. Lutia was alive. Ende had abandoned his seclusion and now assisted with work at the Imperial Palace.
I knew they were illusions. But they were such blissful illusions. Within them, I was merely a foolish Emperor’s Son helping the Empress Mother with her duties, while Ende cursed at me, complaining about the abundance of work at the Palace.
Lutia always held a baby—Pisha in her infancy. The child always slept, but when I approached, her eyes would flutter open and she would call me father.
“That’s right, Pisha. It’s father.”
Pisha, knowing I was her father, grasped my finger and giggled. When Pisha laughed, Lutia laughed too, and Ende and the Chief Chamberlain reproached me, saying our smiles were identical.
Everything I yearned for existed in that place. Even if it was a dream, it mattered not. If it was a dream, I simply wouldn’t wake.
When the tonic’s effects wore off, it became unbearable. I instructed the Lorowi Marquis to continue supplying me with the substance. This way, I would never wake from the dream. I was happy here.
Even as flames consumed my feet and fire engulfed my entire body, I felt only the warmth of those dear to me.
I was eternally happy.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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